Kee Zublin joined the South administration as the new principal in July. To give South students a chance to get to know him, The Axe interviewed him to find out about his philosophy on education, his plans for
South, and more.

Zublin has roots in the area, but moved around a lot growing up. He attended South for one year. Now, his younger daughter attends Adams Elementary.

Zublin started as principal at South this summer and worked for almost two months without students in the building.

“When the students finally arrived I felt this sense of joy, like this is what I’ve been working towards this whole time, and now they’re finally here,” he said.

Before coming to South, Zublin was the Director of Teaching and Learning for Secondary for the Bethel school district, managing middle and high schools. He explained how his previous job was a desk job, and he wasn’t around kids all the time.

“I missed it,” he said. “My favorite job I ever had was high school principal, and so I’m enjoying being high school principal again.”

Many students have probably seen Zublin around South: before school, during passing periods, and generally throughout the day. “My goal is to get to know every kid here, and that’s why I’m out in the halls all the time,” he said. When asked if he had any high or low points so far, he described a major low point as times when he comes across as authoritarian.

“In my work to get kids to class,” Zublin explained, “sometimes that can feel to students potentially like I’m a bit of an authority figure, and I don’t love that. My goal is to always be humane with students, and let them know that they’re loved and that I care about them. A major high point is when I’m connecting with kids on a human level.”

Zublin also has a vision for his work at South. “My focus in education,” he said, “is if we center the needs of our most marginalized kids, and we do it thoughtfully, then we not only support them, but we don’t in any way disadvantage the other students.”

Zublin gave an example: sentence starters for class discussions. In a class dis cussion, some students might be completely fine participating, and others might struggle. A teacher can have brief sentence starters such as, “I agree with…” or “I disagree with this because…” Such sentence starters are there for any student who needs just that little nudge to get started, and it doesn’t hurt others who can jump right in to have them posted and visible up on a class wall.

When it comes to this year’s schedule change, Zublin is upbeat about making the most of it. “I have ideas on how we can make those 90 minutes fun and engaging and meaningful,” he said, “but it’s going to take all of us collectively putting our heads together to make this new schedule really fly.”

“I also am really passionate about small group instruction,” he said, talking about the importance of student collaboration. “There’s a time and place for lecturing, there’s also a time and place for collaborative learning. Humans are social, and we often learn best together. One of my goals will be to continue to get better at that kind of pedagogy [teaching strategy].” This connects a lot to Zublin’s outlook on education. “My philosophy of education,” he explained, “is that humans are profoundly social, and that we learn in that way.”

The new schedule hasn’t been the only change this school year has seen. Many students have noticed and been impacted by stricter rules around where students can be during the day, particularly during free periods. “The purpose is it serves our whole overarching goal – which is to be in class, learning,” Zublin said. “If we have a lot of movement in the halls during class, it’s really really hard to determine who’s actually supposed to be in class and who is not … We ask that the students really work with us to be either off campus, in class, or in the library as much as possible.”

And after last spring’s repeated building evacuations, safety is an utmost concern.

“There’s also some safety reasons for the changes,” Zublin said, “so I’m trying to address some of the anxiety that students at South might be feeling after last year by having the new [secured] entryway, safe
and organized halls – all of those things serve that purpose, as well.” All of this ties into Zublin’s big-picture goals for South. “I want every student to feel like they belong, that they are known by name and that they are loved,” he said. “And I want them to go to class. So you’ll see me trying to hustle kids to class quite a bit here, and my hope is that stops being as much the case soon, as kids get the memo that we want them here.”

Ultimately, Zublin’s vision is for South to be a place where students want to be. “We want community, we want people to be here on time, we want class to be meaningful, we want kids to feel like they’re better off here than just staying at home on Canvas,” he said.

Article by Aria Lynn-Skov